News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1887-09-01
THE CLOWNS BRIDE.
Loves Young Dream on Farm
Ended when the Circus Came.
GFrom the indianapolis journal. |

From the Indianapolis JOufHdi.
A gentleman of some prominence III
business circles was sitting with a friend
in the Grand Hotel office last night,
when the conversation drifted to circus
management and enterprise. ''The
coming of Forepaugh," he said, ''re-
calls one of the most interesting periods
of my life. 1t has enough romance in
it to make it worth the telling. Besides,
it shows what peculiar incidents some
times follow from fancied affection.
Thirty years ago [ was experiencing on
Nebraska farm what falls to the lot of
well-to-do farmers boys. [ had my
pleasures, but they came at intervals,
after DAYS and weeks of hard work. We
had a neighbOr whose daughter won my
fancy. She was beautiful, vivacious,
and just such girl as to win the atten-
ton of a guileless youth like myself.
Young love ran blindly along until my
father discovered that the neighbOr's
pretty daughter and myself We're en-
gagged to marry. However, this betroth-
al, or what you may call it, did not take
place until 1868, when L was about Is
years old. My father made it a lively
engagement fOl me, and finally sue
ceeded in blasting my hopes. The young
lady and / made several attempts at
elopement, but he always frustrated
them. Ny love dream continued, with
repeated Interruptions, until the neigh
boris daughter left home and went to
Omaha, where she took service in no
tel. Her people were poor. 1t became
necessary for her to earn her own living.
As 1 had nothing without my fathers
10 a wIfa wa com
cluded to wait year OF two longer, and
in the mean time she was to work and
save for the common fund upon which
we expected to go to housekeeping.
"What was the RESULT" the friend in
quired.
81 am coming to that. In it lies the
romance of my story, or what little
there is of it. My promised wife had
been gone but few months when she
wrote me that she had married circus
clown, and was preparing to take her
place in Orton's show. l was sorely
grieved for time, while my father was
greatly elated."
"Did you ever see her again p
''Did I? Well, [ do not want to see
her again under such circumstances.
One day, two or three years after that,
/ was in Omaha. A circus was in town,
Coles, as well as / can recollect. While
on the way to the show grounds unex-
pectedly overlook my old sweetheart and
her husband the clown. The meeting was
friendly enough. Both of us had recOv-
cred from our youthful infatuation, and
could meet without embarrassment. We
three walked together to the circus, but
the affairs of the old neighbOrhood and
old times which my once promised
bride and myself encountered were not
interesting to the husband. Directly
he said: you take Nellie down to the
show. I have to go back to the hotel.
I did so, and went into the dressing
tent on her invitation. | had been
about two minutes among the horses
and elephants, talking to Nellie before
she went into the women's department.,
when received terrific blow back of
the ear. 1t knocked me sprawling, dan
gerously near to the feet of a huge ele-
plant. Nellie screamed, assisted by
the other women, and and half dozen
strong armed canvasmen rushed in, and,
seeing me, the stranger i'll the camp,
started to beat out what little life was
left in me. The women interfered, the
believing elephant got loose, the horses
cavorted, and in the menagerie the lions
and tigers roared, the monkeys chat
tered and the deuce was to pay"
"Well, what did you do z"
"What did / do! Why / sneaked out
while the uproar was at its height. Do
you think was going to stay there and
be knocked down again by an iron jawed,
copper-bound cannon ball performer.
supported by half-dozen brawny and
Misunderstanding canvasmen. From
that day to this | don't know whether
it was accident or the jealousy of the
husband that caused my suffering. |
am sure he had no reason to fear Nellie
and / running away. Both of us had
got bravely over our young loves dream.
I never saw her again until twelve years
later, when Coup's circus came here. [
took my wife to the show in the after
noon, and when the trapeze act came on,
so did Nellie, to my. surprise. To see
her hang by her teeth in midair was the
wonder of wonders. | could think of
nothing but those happy callow days on
the Nebraska farm. Here was /, the
farmers boy, in good business, with a
there the sweetheart of long ago, the
uelSnDOI pItGIy uduSH1cI, o"lhSIhS
through the air with the greatest of
ease and holding on with her teeth like
grim death to slender rope. OF course,
[ went to the circus again that night
and saw Nellie. She was still beautiful,
winning and entertaining, as l found i'll
calling on her i'll the dressing tent.
Since had seen her on that memorable
day in Omaha she had been around the
world and came back with net saving
of $4,000. 1t represented part of her
her salary, but the most of it came from
the sale of her photographs in South
America, where she was immensely
popular. Nellie and her husband sep
arated some time after daughter was
born to them in Australia. He is now
in Chicago. She married again, and
when Forepaugh's show comes here
again intend to go and see little Bel
mont, the darling and beautiful per-
former in the menage act. 1t is little
B elmont, Nellie's daughter"